


keep it good

by ghostwit



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: A rando gets disappeared It's fine. Horrible people being good to each other., As in. not AU. doesn't intersect w/ canon doe., Canon Compliant, Fluff, Here's a classic:, Hurt/Comfort, Liddle morning after piece., Like reverse hurt/comfort. comfort/hurt., M/M, Sharing a Bed, Touch of character study, mild possessive behavior
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:53:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24419965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostwit/pseuds/ghostwit
Summary: Peter is gone when Elias wakes, predictably so, no reason for him to have remained.(I've never been so close to something good. / Keep it like a secret 'cause it could go bad.)
Relationships: Elias Bouchard/Peter Lukas
Comments: 8
Kudos: 52





	keep it good

**Author's Note:**

> Long-hair Peter! Long-hair Peter!

Peter is gone when Elias wakes, predictably so, no reason for him to have remained. He doesn’t fault him for it, if he had this… arrangement of theirs would’ve been cut short ages (quite literally) ago. There’s a sort of assuredness in it, a hungry sort of comfort, hollow and starved: I love you, I love you, _I love you_ , but not more than. A contingency that follows the both of them neatly, unable to betray their natures, Elias rolling over to sink in plush sheets and take a deep, deep lungful of the lingering wisps of mist and chilling moisture, casting out aimlessly with the Beholding in what he knows is a futile search for his lover. It wicks the moisture from his skin, draining him of last night with a chill that seems to scoop him of his innards, leave them messy and slick on expensive bedding, divorced completely enough from himself to cast doubt as to whether they were ever his. He twitches. 

And it’s just then that he gets a bite, Peter padding in from the doorway with the Lonely slipping in hissing streams around his elbows and curling from his underarms, giving himself a grin bordering on salacious into the mirror behind which Elias lurks (which, of course he does). It’s strange to have him back so soon, with the way dawn is trailing her desolate fingers around the flat with morning fog and streaks of desaturated color, turning the entirety of London into something reminiscent of the dreamy wash of the Lonely, but he’s riding the coattails of some sort of high, it seems. He doesn’t sport that grin when he steps into the bedroom, the expression having been a passing facade over hard brows and slight lips carved from apathy just for Elias. He hums, soaking the last dregs of lonely from the bed before turning, arching the length of his pale, slender back _just so_ as he turns to meet Peter’s eyes with his own. 

“Ah, Petey, my little masochist. Back to ruin your mood already?” He opens his arms even as he speaks, reveling in the shiver of discomfort Peter fails to repress at his boring stare, compounded with all the power of his patron.

Peter laughs in turn, cheery and oddly clipped, dull in a charming sort of way. His affect of speech--at least when he spares it, particularly when he’s working to get his way-- usually well-cloaked in eloquence and a posh sense of bourgeoise charisma is not something other people pick up on, usually, only the spindly, invasive fingers of the Beholding gnawing at that almost-there quality until it unfurls itself in full light to Elias and his kin. He adores it. 

Peter’s weight makes the bed dip, lavish wood frame giving a forgiving creak as it takes the brunt of combined avoirdupois. Elias wastes no time in smothering the other, hitching his still-bare legs up over the captain’s hips and wrapping those enticingly splayed arms around his midriff. Peter shivers again, dipping to kiss Elias, soft and deep. He gives a languid roll of his hips, enjoying the coarse slide of cloth over cool skin, just the right side of scratchy to remind Elias of the way the other likes to press the long line of his throat against Elias’ stomach, soft hair on softer skin. 

He doesn’t respond in kind, though, almost puzzling, the only real way to get any affection from the other by sharing skin. Peter just swaddles him, tracing the jut of his cheekbone with his nose, pressing kisses along the side of his face and into his hairline, nudging against his earring with his lips, and then just the barest hint of tongue. His hands sweep along the narrow of his waist, settle firm and cool on his hips. Elias tuts to keep from purring into the sensation, reaching behind Peter to pull their duvet up around them and begin sifting through the sections of Peter’s mind left unguarded by the Lonely. 

A little gift, how nice.

She had leaned against Peter, by accident, weary with hands folded in her lap and the arch of her spine lax against the bench. A busy woman, run ragged. She stiffens when she contacts him, large and just barely warm against the chill of the morning. She flushes, and smiles demurely, offering a hand to shake. Ah, bad move. Elias doesn’t need the Beholding to know the disgust and irritation suffusing the sailor to his core. 

Elias Watches as Peter stretches those long fingers up, to reach over the expanse of the woman's forehead, recoiling at the warmth there with the calloused, almost intimate press; Peter couldn’t have been paying attention, rarely does, but Elias can See. The woman’s flush had deepened, heart jackrabbiting in her chest as she swept over his form, thick wrists and dark hair cut with handsome streaks of grey, well-kept beard, subconsciously absorbing features everyone but Elias notes as shallowly plain and unremarkable. It’s equal parts adrenal fear and instinctual attraction. Elias' sick satisfaction becomes just a little bit more personal.

He watches her eyes go dim as she halts on a greeting, like removing the backlight on a computer, hands twitching in place with the rolling lift-drop, lift-drop of insect legs, back stiffened against wrought iron. Elias Watches, the sensation of being sunk back into her own consciousness bit by agonizing bit, being pulled by her own metaphorical struggle like her identity’s been set to rest on a bed of marshy, sucking seaweed. How wonderful, fear burning slow and hot like well-seasoned oak. Her neck judders in place, jolting on a hoarse swallow that makes a long strand of hair sweep into her face, brush over the back of Peter’s knuckles.

And with a repulsed jolt from Peter, she disappears. It’s sudden and gradual all in one, stuttering away with the sharp scent of something wintry following the limbs that seem to melt away like dry ice. The bus rolls up to the stop, idling and spitting black fumes from the exhaust for four deliciously excruciating minutes as Peter crosses and uncrosses his legs, before rolling away with a sputter of gears. Her delicate face is reflected in the window, eyes wide and dilated with fear, hair mussed as if she’d been running hands through it, but the bus remains empty. Peter waves to her, each finger fluttering independently, one after the other, and he shoots her a lonely smile as her form recedes from view.

Elias barks a sharp little laugh, like the yip of an especially cruel lapdog, giving Peter’s hair a rewarding yank so it can come loose from it’s sloppy tie with an appreciative groan right against Elias’ throat. He settles down a little further, arms tight and snug around Elias, and he’s just the right temperature to make them both comfortable, even slotted against each other so surely. 

“Take off your coat,” Elias says, as his fingers slide soothingly through salt-and-pepper hair. Peter groans again. “It’s scratchy.” He gives another cant upwards with his hips, letting Peter hear the drag on his bare skin, as if to emphasize the fact. 

It’s a lie--half of one, the coat is quite abrasive--Elias indulging that inane urge he sometimes gets to sometimes hear, _feel_ the other man’s heartbeat pressed right up against him rather than through any fabric, or through the overexposed lens of the Watcher, to know he’s really there. Just skin to skin, monster to monster. 

Peter huffs a private laugh--most of his expressions, if any at all, are private--almost as if he knows (not really his field), but doesn’t move except to press an exceptionally wet kiss to Elias’ forehead as he shimmies up the bed. “Good morning,” he mutters, breathing deep against his partner and adjusting him in his arms. Elias gives an annoyed tug on the hair cascading in sweeps and rollicks like a waterfront view over Peter’s clothed back.

Don’t let it be said that there’s ever a moment of ungratefulness for the Lukas Family’s patronage in Elias’ mind, but now especially so, expensive bedding of high denier and artisan care making each awkward wriggle of the pair an absolutely luxurious rush of sensation; It’s enough to make him simply _allow_ the fitting with an almost-fond smile, to slip warmly back into sleep, still smothered by the brute. 

He doesn’t heed any of the pangs of weakness settling at the base of his throat, hot-wet until they dry and calcify on each scraping breath. Not even when he wakes again to an empty bed in full sunlight, a still-open bag of expensive coffee grounds slumping on his countertop and the air suspiciously devoid of any chill.

**Author's Note:**

> Thinking about Elias being able to see things about Peter people tend to pass over because of their affiliations T_T gay people. 
> 
> Anyway. never forget the fourth F for when you get approached by a scary, handsome sailor. (I actually spent an unreasonable amount of time thinking about how unrealistic it would be for someone fem-passing to be like OhFuckYah in response to a man being like :reach: while you're waiting for a bus but like. just saying. I'd be into it.)
> 
> Please leave a comment/concrit/etc. if you have any thoughts at all. I really do appreciate it, I was really stunned by the response for the last time I wrote this pairing and hope to see some of you guys again T_T <3
> 
> hazeism.tumblr.com


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